This “energy transition” could affect up to one-in-eight workers in Canada., according to a leaked government memo. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
The cat really is out of bag now. The transition memo leaked last week shows the Trudeau government is prepared to wage war on GHG emissions and is ready to fight until every last good job in Western Canada is gone. It doesn’t matter how much or how hard the CBC and Liberal spin doctors try to sugar coat it, federal officials finally got caught saying the quiet part out loud.
The memo admits federal government emissions reduction plans threaten to “disrupt” the lives and livelihoods of as many as 2.7 million Canadian workers. And it acknowledges the impacts on employment will fall hardest on Alberta followed by Saskatchewan and Newfoundland
As expected, CBC personalities and Liberal apologists have leapt to the government’s defence. They’ve been busy explaining that according to the “Sunny Ways” dictionary the word “disruption” is synonymous for all things good and wonderful. It reminds one of the wonderful things that happened to buggy whip manufacturers when the automobile disrupted their lives.
On the other hand, the memo indicates we have little to fear from the disruption because those of us who transition to janitorial work or already work as cleaners will still be in demand.
Avid readers of Pipeline Online have known for years that the federal government’s emissions reduction efforts have been and will continue to be ruinous for the Prairies. The only real surprise this week was that the government got caught putting it on paper.
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The memo actually provides what look to be realistic estimates of the employment related costs of outfitting Justin Trudeau and Steven Guilbeault with their wings and halos. According to the memo the disruptions will affect areas of employment that currently account for approximately 13 per cent of Canada’s workforce, or one in eight.
The eminent Canadian-born environmental sociologist, Allan Schnaiberg, theorized that if a government policy measure intended to benefit the environment threatens to cause a noticeable reduction in the rate of GDP growth, that policy would face opposition from among ordinary working people, businesses and from within government and from regional and local governments. I’m a big fan of Schnaiberg because the predictions his theories suggests are often validated in real life. So far he’s pretty much bang on with respect to the opposition to federal climate change policy. The only area where questions remain is how much opposition to the federal emissions reduction plans there is within the Liberal cabinet and caucus. Are they all crazy? Perhaps not. Maybe the memo was intentionally leaked by one of the few sane people in the asylum.
Another insight we can draw from Schnaiberg is that if an environmental policy comes at the cost of a reduction in national income, the costs of that reduction should be shared as equitably as possible. Fairness in sharing the costs among all members of a society has the potential to lessen opposition among those whose lives are being disrupted. When decision makers in central Canada implement environmental policies that negatively impact one region more than others, it is hardly conducive to national harmony and is likely to increase opposition to the policy in the most hard-hit region.
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Of course many Prairie people including provincial premiers have been critical of federal environmental policies for years. Premiers Wall, Moe, Prentice, Kenney and Smith have all campaigned against federal emissions reduction targets and environmental approval rules that make it virtually impossible to build anything outdoors. Nonetheless the memo shows that the economic impacts of federal climate change were not being ignored by the Trudeau government due to naivete and ignorance. They’ve actually known how damaging the costs will be, but until now managed to keep it secret. We now know they are knowingly prepared to let the West bear the heavy cost of Liberal virtue.
The Calgary Herald reported this week that when seeing it all laid out in black and white, the memo came as a kick in the gut for Danielle Smith. Prior to the leak even Alberta NDP leader Rachel Notley had distanced herself from federal climate change policy, claiming that the pace and cost of emissions reductions was overly ambitious, economically damaging and unlikely to be achieved. On the other hand, here on the Great Flatness the local NDP remain wedded to whatever Jagmeet thinks is best.
The memo leak may indeed be the harbinger of a turning point in Canadian political life. After reading what they have planned for us it is unlikely rural people, blue collar workers, business people and investors on the Prairies will ever be content with the current state of confederation.
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